JAMBOREE JOURNAL, Volume 3
Aaaaand welcome back!
As we reach the Round of 16, we mostly have the top tier players playing and more advanced strategies taking the stage, which are sure to rustle the jimmies of many a viewer. This time, I will be focusing on one match, as there was a lot to write about, both in the unconventional designs of the civs and the strategy employed.
ETHIOPIAN CURRY
UBERJZ VS MONGOBILLIONE
ETHIOPIA VS BELGIUM, ESOC BAJA CALIFORNIA
Uber has been quite the interesting player in this tourney. PR26 and a regular WOL player, he manages to give Colonels a run for their money. He is also the inventor of the strategy I will describe in the current volume.
Ethiopia is a pretty interesting civ, and one of my personal favourites. It also belongs to the African Archetype, unique to WOL.
[spoiler=African civs have a couple of unique aspects:]
- 1. African shipments belong in 4 categories based on certain non-African civs and each shipment of that type gives you a bonus based on that civ. For example, Ethiopia has access to the Indian category, which gives you a free villager with each shipment of that type you send.
2. Export! African civs can gather Export from Spice Stalls, unlike Asian civs who trickle it. This lets them train units from respective non-Africans(in the Spice Shop that you train Stalls from), like Sepoy and Cossacks among others for Ethiopia. Africans also have shipments of such units that cost Export, most notably in Age 4, when you want 1500HP Cannons on Elephants(we’ll get to that). Plus, some advanced techs cost export to research, giving massive bonuses.
3. Africans Age up with the Library, that offers a bunch of cheap techs you research, and then proceed age with. They are categorised as Military(red), Economy(yellow), Buildings(blue),. If you want to age up to Age 2, you either research all 3 techs displayed above, or two techs of one colour. Note that African civs generally can’t train any units unless they research the second Red tech.
4. Africans do not have Mills/Plantations. For late game food, you have the bane of all AoE2 players, Lots. These are cheap and contain limited food(500 for starters), so get ready for a lot of reseeding. From the Granary you get Lot Porters that build those for free, so you can expect to not be desperate for wood later on. As for late game gold, you have Quarries that spawn mines for a cheap upfront cost. Similar to how you train herdables, only usable immediately after spawn. Both of these have techs that improve the gather rate and amount of resources contained. A word of warning, this can get really tedious in the late game, so just be prepared for it, or try to win it before you have to switch. On the bright side, this makes African civs solid at turtling thanks to being able to more reliably switch to local resources instead of feeling forced to move villies out of your base. Although this only really applies to Ethiopia, as Zulu and Egypt are far more aggressive civs.
5. African military is split into 3 buildings. Garrison for cheap and archaic units, Cantonement for advanced, unique and mid-lategame units, and Palace for elite, export costing units, that can turn the tide of the match. Palace also acts as an African Fort, which is especially fun for Ethiopia...
[spoiler=As for some unique Ethiopian aspects:]
- 1. Ethiopia periodically gets free Porters from the Town Center, which can build any available building for free. Even so, the Ethiopian start is still painfully slow, due to starting with 5 villies, no villie shipments except Indian ones until Age 3 and…
2. Ethiopian houses are Apartments, which cost 150 wood and grant only 5 pop initially.
3. Ethiopia gets, on average, 400 wood, which lets it build a Library and an early Trading Post, to sling itself and ideally circumvent the painfully slow start.
4. Red Techs, which are most expensive, grant access to military buildings and units, plus they make defensive buildings(including Town Center) and Gunpowder Units hit harder. You like Towers in AoE2? I found the civ for you!
5. Yellow techs, with moderate cost, refund a good part of their cost in Food, alongside enabling some economic buildings. Remember the refund, for it is really important for the strategy later on in the text.
6. Blue techs, which are cheapest, increase Apartment pop by 5 each and increase building HP, allowing Ethiopia to potentially reach a ridiculous 20000 HP on Town Centers alone.
As for unique units, other than the units already present in TAD and which he trained/shipped using Export, Uber relied on 3 units, mostly from shipments.
Oromo Horseman is a unique Ethiopian Cavalry unit, and is similar to the Spanish Lancer in TAD. Overall a fairly reliable unit, with cost similar to a Hussar and doing 75 dmg per hit to Infantry. Even versus Musketeers and Pikes these guys pack a strong punch, not to mention fighting Skirmishers…
Selfenga is an Ultimate Ethiopian unit. Basically a super Skirmisher that can demolish armies if on the defensive, due to gaining damage the closer it is to the Town Center and having multipliers vs everything but Melee Cavalry, which the Tigray Lancer can handle(a Pikeman similar to the Kamayuk in AOE2, with a long spear allowing it to attack from behind other frontline units)
Wanna see the definition of overkill? Ethiopia has access to two insane cannons. The Mountain Gun is available to all Africans, and is definitely worth aging to Industrial for, to ship two of these. With 28 range they can stand back safely in most matchups and mow down masses of Infantry, one cannonball at a time.
And now for the Big Daddy, the Bane of all Existence, the Sebastopol!
This unit is utterly brutal for Sieges, dealing 1500 damage per shot on Buildings and packing 800HP, ensuring that even when fired on, he will hold on for long. Same can’t be said for those firing, who would soon fly off the map, with Big Daddy packing 550 base damage! For mowing down infantry, go Mountain Gun. For blowing half the map off the face of the Earth, go Sebastopol! Just be wary that he will slow down your movement a lot, only having 2.5 speed when in mobile mode. In the game, Uber didn’t rely on Sebastopols that much, as he was preparing a defensive force mainly, and he shipped 2 Mountain Guns, plus the certain Elephants I mentioned…
In all seriousness, this unit hits really hard and can take a punch, but other than shipping one in Age4, it is a massive investment, and you best be sure if you wanna train it. Don’t go for it every single game expecting amazing results, don’t develop the Great Bombard syndrome.
Another fun thing to note is an Ethiopian shipment called Goa Migration. In Age 3, this allows all Ethiopian Town Centers to trickle villies, similar to Ottomans. The trickle is of the same rate as the normal villager training, which lets Ethiopia explode in Age3+.[/spoiler]
[spoiler=Ah, Belgium. The land of waffles, chips and the Heart of Darkness.]A WOL-unique civ and more vanillesque, part of the original European archetype. If you like Natives and wanna play a WoL civ as someone from TAD, Belgium can be a fun choice to gradually get used to WOL’s quirks.
The main Belgian bonus gives its Trading Posts an aura, weakening the enemy gather rates by 5% per TP, stacking additively. Adding to that the fact that Belgium starts with a free Frontier Wagon, giving them the ability to build a TP from the get go, plus a free Frontier Wagon per Age up, on maps with a lot of Trading posts, this can prove to be very valuable for map domination, eco boosts and screwing build orders, for players that devise their strats to the second.
Natives are 10% cheaper, incentivising Native strats, alongside Belgium getting a few natives by default(not needing to build a TP at local native sites), trainable at the Native Embassy.
In order, Hunga-Munga is sorta similar to the old Iroquois Tomahawk, dealing Melee damage at range and fighting Cav well, Niam-Niam is a Pikeman with 5 speed, and Zappo-Zap is great at shooting down mercs, other natives and enemy Villagers, making it a fun raiding unit and great for rushing as an auxillary to secure the win.
Belgium also has (Royal Guard)Rangers(WOL’s Crossbowman equivalent to TAD) that can be made to cost 80 food instead of 40f/40w and can have solid siege thanks to special shipments. Also worth mentioning is the massive Police Elephant, with 1000HP and massive AOE damage, a very expensive but really strong frontline unit to make Indians proud! It costs 700 resources though and takes 5 pop slots, so better be sure you actually want to train it.
As for unique units that were featured in the game, Mongo mainly relied on Force Publique, Mittraleuse and Bicycle Infantry, alongside a bunch of Hussars.
Force Publique is the Belgian skirmisher. Fairly similar to the standard one, but slightly bulkier and with more consistent damage. The unit is generally a more cost and pop-efficient counter to Heavy Inf, Ranged Cav and Natives, in case the opponent wants to out-Native you.
In Age 3, Belgians can boast having a Mitrailleuse to mow down infantry for a rather cheap cost. It is also fairly reliable compared to other artillery units, thanks to Royal Guard Rangers, solid meatshields and nice skirms covering against its deadly enemy, Cavalry.
Bicycle Infantry is the signature Belgian unit. A highly mobile quasi-skirmisher that also does a good job at raiding thanks to a multiplier vs Villies. Ironically, while it counters them, it also gets countered by skirmishers. Do keep this in mind if you wanna counter skirms with them. When fighting Belgium, expect the player to stock up on these due to their versatility and mobility, and be really careful in case they go for raids.[/spoiler]
Now, for the game itself. As mentioned before, Uber is the inventor of an interesting strategy, that being the African Fast Industrial(FI). Remember the Yellow Techs that refund? By focusing the economy on gold and food, he was able to reach Age 4 by 8:40, and then spam 2 shipments of Sepoy + Siege Elephant, alongside a Selfenga shipment, giving him an pretty strong army rather quickly. He caught up eco-wise using the Goa Migration and made an army based purely on Export. Cossacks, Sepoy, Siege Elephants. And it worked.
Mongo decided to focus on booming up, deciding against rushing such a great turtle civ, only opting for smaller Hussar Raids. Uber took the opportunity to go for a very dangerous Fast Industrial, without any defences, nor military. All went into the economy. This means that by the time Mongo prepared an army, he was barely Age 3 and staring at a behemoth with 5 elephants, 30 Sepoy and 2 massive cannons. Not a good prospect, and soon his army stood in tatters, and he resigns with a city and honour intact.
After this game I noticed a few players asking “How to defeat this strategy? How can I end him in 8 minutes?”. I will keep it simple. Rush! The strategy forgoes any standard military training in favour of quick aging and relying on shipments and techs to get going. Those Buildings might seem scary with their upwards of 10000HP, but the damage upgrades are all in the Red Techs. The ones he won’t research for a while. As long as you keep the pressure and prevent him from swarming his base with Towers, you can keep him down, prevent him from aging, and make him use precious shipments for units instead of economy boosts. Plus, if he is pressured and on the backfoot, he needs 800 food to be able to train basic, archaic units. Not a good prospect. So don’t worry! While this strat may seem scary at first, you indeed can fight it and beat it!
As for these two, Uber went on to do a similar strat with Zulu and proceeded to win with 3:1, finishing with the embodiment of Zerg, Paraguay!
If you wanna watch the replay, the download link for it is here → https://eso-community.net/download/file.php?id=16241
Sadly I wasn't able to find the VOD for it nor the Youtube video of it. If anyone finds one let me know!
Expect Volume 4 to be shorter and pretty soon, as I wanna get ready to cover Round of 8!
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